In contrast to Airbus’ own admission that the A380 orders will not pick up until the end of 2011 or early-2012, Airbus has raised its sales forecast this year for the superjumbo from 10 to 20. Meanwhile, Airbus highlighted the A380’s popularity at its Innovation Days 2010.
This sales target is undoubtedly achievable should Emirates place additional orders as widely expected; however, whether its popularity for airlines is as high as Airbus touted remains questionable.
On the first day of Airbus Innovation Days 2010, Airbus claimed that “the A380 is the new flagship” and that 11 of the top 20 international airlines have ordered the A380.
Ironically enough, all of those 11 A380 customers listed but one have deferred their A380 deliveries – British Airways’ A380 order is the most vulnerable now that its flight attendant union Unite has announced a fresh wave of strikes that may last 20 days in total.
Its arch-rival, Virgin Atlantic, has even indefinitely deferred A380 deliveries to an unknown date and ILFC is more than likely to convert its A380 orders into additional A350 XWB orders, given that the transition cost on the A380 is “prohibitive”.
All images courtesy of Airbus
The undisputable fact is that the large airplane market has been shrinking for the last decade.
According to Official Airline Guide (OAG) figures, there has been a 7% growth in the average number of seats per airplane in 1980-1990, but this changed to a sluggish growth of 2% in 1990-2000 and has been shrinking steadily during 2000-2009.
Renowned aviation professor at Ohio State University Nawal Taneja believes that the economic crisis will mean carriers “down-gauging to smaller aircraft on long-haul routes, install more premium economy [class seat]”.
Meanwhile, Airbus accused Boeing of “bending A380 facts” since this is “the only way the 747-8 can look good”.
Airbus’ claim too is misleading.
In this case, Boeing did not “bend A380 facts” nor did Airbus bend the 747-8 Intercontinental facts.
It all depends on configuration. The A380 would burn 8% less fuel than the 747-8I should the former adopt a 525-seat configuration and the latter adopt a 405-seat configuration.
However, should the 747-8I adopt the 467-seat configuration, the 747-8 Intercontinental will burn 2.6L of fuel per passenger per 100 kilometer, whereas the A380 burns 3.0L in a 525-seat configuration.
In the meantime, Airbus boasted the improved capability and increased weight version of the A380 from 2012 onwards.
As a result of the ongoing planned weight-saving program, the Maximum Takeoff Weight (MTOW) of A380 will increase by 4 tonnes from 569 tonnes to 573 tonnes and a range increase of 100 nm on routes with the original amount of payload.
“A380 weight (MWE) was about 5 tonnes over its specifications in 2007, as has been widely reported; continuing weight savings have been steadily implemented with successive deliveries; however, all the aircraft delivered, from first delivery onwards, have met or bettered their various guarantees (payload, range, fuel burn); and this with each and every customer,” Airbus spokeswoman Marcella Muratore told me.
“Customers have actually testified to this in the media, so there are no ‘early, less capable’ A380s. Continuing weight savings is to bring A380 MWE within ~0.5% of the original 2001 specification, over the near term, for the sake of maximum efficiency,” Muratore elaborated.
Indeed, these performance improvements are very well achievable, but these have to come in the form of further late engineering changes – how and how much these late engineering changes will affect the A380’s delivery schedule is anyone’s guess.
Airbus boasted a 50% reduction in the amount of outstanding work on the A380 assembly lines, albeit the fact that it is struggling with the production ramp-up. Airbus has delivered just 4 A380s by the end of April this year at 1 per month production rate, although slightly better than last year’s mere 10 full-year deliveries, it is very likely, if not certain, that Airbus won’t be able to meet this year’s delivery goal of 20 A380s with Korean Air’s first example sliding into 2011.
Worse yet, these late engineering changes will continue to plague Airbus and its suppliers that are unable to produce A380 parts beyond the current rate.
It seems that what Airbus claims is one thing, but the reality is an utterly different one.
Daniel Tsang
